Any body know an easy way to tell what direction your boat is drifting without a visual reference and without dropping an anchor?

I have access to a hand held gps, but it still seems a bit tricky to get a quick fix on the compass bearing of the drift.

Cheers
Bluey

You need to reference it against something. If you have no visual reference then its GPS.

Your GPS should have a heading display. This should tell you direction of travel.

Not to be confused with course or bearing.

Thanks PH
I'll tell george to bring the manual along with his gps next time and have a read.

Its also depends on your boat, if you've got a high-sided or hardtop boat, it may be wind driven more than the current. I've experienced this on windy days.

The fact still remains that you be able to tell the direction that you're moving with PH's suggestions.

Just if you're dropping divers off, and the current is going a diff direction to the wind, then you could end up far apart.